Tough Guy
Posted on May 11th, 2010 by Stoic1I am the first son of a Korean vet. My dad always told us he was a clerk at “Headquarters” and never saw combat. After he drank himself to death, I learned that wasn’t true. My uncle told me he had been a ground pounder on the front lines. They had slept in 3 man tents, and my dad happened to be in the middle one morning… when he awoke to find his tent mates on either side had had their throats cut during the night. My uncle said he was never the same after that.
He married my mom after the war – and I came along less than 9 months later. He couldn’t stand to hear me cry and shoveled abuse upon my mom until I was 4 months old…then he started in on me too. When I cried I got hit, spanked, and yelled at until finally, he would leave. By the time I was one, I could spell my name and count 10 pennies; because if I didn’t get it right, I’d get slapped. He was determined to make me “tough” – and “smart” – “even if it kills him”. The first thoughts I can recall from my childhood was that I wanted to die. Infractions or weakness were beaten out me then until I was 12, but I’d learned at 9 they were shorter if I didn’t cry, so I stopped. My mom left him when I was 12 too, however the consequences didn’t leave, they were a part of me.
I was 18 the first time I attempted suicide, and attempted many more times in the next 13 years, until I quit drinking myself and started to make amends. I had become him. In therapy, I learned that I acted out the survivor’s suicidal rage he had manifest as violence directed outward in his denial, yet he finally attained the unconscious, denied goal of self destruction when his liver stopped working. He never allowed himself to know his demons.
I still struggle with depression at 55, and relationships are a challenge for me as I sometimes slip back into my old mindset when I’m under stress. I’m convinced I developed fibromyalgia from a lifetime of muscle tension that attacked the nerves in my myofacia, and I am further disabled from losing my right arm in my last attempt in 2004.
I’m encouraged to have found this website, and see an organized effort to help all of the wounded souls cut by wars and social misunderstanding of the consequences. Perhaps humanity will finally decide the cost of war is too great to bear any longer, and those of us with the unseen disease will stop passing on the sins of our fathers.
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Tough Guy, you are a survivor, and this takes courage. It takes courage to live through all this pain, to seek and find help, and now to reach out to others, tell the story of your life and give the rest of us hope.
There is some divine ember, spark–now flame– deep inside you that will not die.
Glad you’re with us.
Thank you.
Well “tough guy” you were lucky to have made it out of that hell your dad put you and your mom through. I am so glad that the survivor instinct was so ingrained in you and you are still with us. Depression is almost a fight with one’s self and the anger seems to fuel it. Knowing that there are people who do want to help can be healing in itself. I know, I’ve been there too.
The people within Veterans’ Heart Ga. are there to listen and provide service to you if that is what you chose. You are brave to let the story out; it takes real courage.
Robert & Warbaby – Thank you both for understanding and offering support – I believe I have work to do here at your site – with your site – I’m not sure what it is yet, or how it will take shape, but if there is any way I can help a Vet to heal from what he or she has had to go through, my experience will not have been in vain.
Many years ago, I went through therapy and support groups for Adult Children of Alcoholics – they saved my life. The great amount of press given to the VA and returning soldiers in the past year or so, engendered a desire within me to delve further into my father’s dis-ease from the stand point of a transgenerational family system specifically as it pertains to passing on trauma to wives and children. I wanted to write the new VA director about helping our current Veterans diffuse the pain and anger they might not know what to do with – but I haven’t done that yet.
I’ll be spending time here – reading and learning more about how you folks see things and what I can learn…how I can heal further. So far, I can say that the nagging events can return even after some parts heal. Suddenly the old feelings can come back. I have done some undergraduate work in conflict management and systems theory some years ago and have been reading Jung for years as well. Perhaps, after a while, I can be of use.
Thank you again.
I am glad that we are sharing the pain that has isolated us for way too much of our lives. Like you, tough guy, I often slip back into old patterns, and isolating myself is one of them. That almost seems the hardest to change. It is still so hard to have confidence, to feel part of a community, to trust.
But the more we talk honestly about our experiences– which, I agree, Bob, takes much courage– the sooner people will recognize the true costs of war and that violence creates a never ending cycle of violence.